{"id":9,"date":"2008-02-28T13:58:38","date_gmt":"2008-02-28T18:58:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/wordpress65\/?p=9"},"modified":"2013-02-16T18:50:45","modified_gmt":"2013-02-16T23:50:45","slug":"whos-afraid-wiretaps","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.grayrinehart.com\/blog\/whos-afraid-wiretaps\/","title":{"rendered":"Who\u2019s Afraid of Wiretaps?"},"content":{"rendered":"

The House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence — the HPSCI, usually pronounced \u201cHIP-see\u201d — will take a classified briefing today on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). We presume the HPSCI members are well-versed in the FISA law itself, so this briefing will cover the current intelligence-gathering situation after the Protect America Act — which amended the FISA — expired on February 17th. In particular, it may include the matter of telecommunications companies\u2019 immunity from lawsuits that arise from their cooperation with national security investigations.<\/p>\n

We may hope that, after this briefing, the HPSCI members rise in support of the bill that recently passed the Senate, and pressure the House leadership to bring the matter to a vote. We remain skeptical, but optimistic. How else are we to live?<\/p>\n

We wonder, however, at the subtle irony that on the HPSCI\u2019s web page, http:\/\/intelligence.house.gov\/<\/a>, we are treated to the graphic of the Homeland Security Advisory System showing an \u201cElevated\u201d threat level: \u201cSignificant risk of terrorist attacks.\u201d How much different might that level be, were it not for our operatives\u2019 ability to eavesdrop on potential terrorist communications? Should our elected leaders not give those operatives every possible tool to protect us?<\/p>\n

Yes, they should; the question is whether they will.<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"pinterest\"<\/a>\"linkedin\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>by <\/span>\"feather\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence — the HPSCI, usually pronounced \u201cHIP-see\u201d — will take a classified briefing today on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). We presume the HPSCI members are well-versed in the FISA law itself, so this briefing will cover the current intelligence-gathering situation after the \u2026 Continue reading → <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[392],"class_list":["post-9","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-musings","tag-security"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grayrinehart.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grayrinehart.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grayrinehart.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grayrinehart.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grayrinehart.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.grayrinehart.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1221,"href":"https:\/\/www.grayrinehart.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9\/revisions\/1221"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grayrinehart.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grayrinehart.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grayrinehart.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}